


The Thing About Twins

by Astre_Red



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, Grief/Mourning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-24
Updated: 2020-07-24
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:29:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25490902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Astre_Red/pseuds/Astre_Red
Summary: Fred dies. And George- well, George moves on.He doesn't have a choice.
Relationships: Fred Weasley & George Weasley
Kudos: 24





	The Thing About Twins

George and Fred Weasley are born on April 1st 1978\. From the instant they are born, they do everything and anything together. They are Fred-and-George and George-and-Fred and no one can tell them apart.

They start everything together, and are persuaded that they will end everything together. But life is a funny thing, full of unforeseen things and cruel twists.

* * *

When people are asked about twins, theirs answers diverge. Some thinks they are a gift, or a curse. Some says that they have a bond no one can hope to understand, and some doesn't understand what's so special about having a twin, isn't it the same thing as having a little or older sibling ?

If you were to ask the Weasley Twins, they would smile a mysterious grin and whisper about privilege and you-can't-understand.

(Here's a thing about twins : when you have a twin, you're never really alone.)

* * *

George and Fred are always together, and look exactly the same. That does not mean they are the same.

Fred has always been wilder, untamable, full of determination and smiles. He was always awake before George, always the first one downstairs eating breakfast while his mother was cooking and yelling to the others to get up. He loves red and blueberries, but hates cherries. He loves sunny days.

George is lazier, more calm though not quite reasonable. His ideas are brighter, but less flashy than Fred's. He draws before sleeping when his twin talks about pranks and days and future. He loves blue and strawberries, but hates blueberries (Sorry Fred !). He loves rainy days.

There are a lot of differencies between Fred and George, but to others, they don't matter at all. They are not individuals, they are Fred-and-George and George-and-Fred and one without another is just blasphemy.

(Here's a thing about twins : no matter how hard you try, if you have one, you will always be _a twin_ to other people, and nothing else.)

* * *

People thinks twins know everything about each other. It's a lie.

Things that George will never tell Fred are numerous. He will never tell him about how he thought going to Ravenclaw when the Hat proposed, thought about how he maybe could be just George, instead of George-and-Fred. He will never tell him about his crush on Angelina and how it hurt when Fred asked her to the ball. He will never tell him about how angry he felt when he claimed Lee Jordan to be _their_ best friend when he first was George's friend from the library.

(Here's a thing about twins : even if you love each other more than anything in the world, you still hate each other, even just a little.)

(Twins's love is stronger than normal siblings's love. The same goes for hatred.)

* * *

George loses his ear. They are not identical anymore.

(It sounds like a warning.)

* * *

Weasley's Wizard Wheezes is Fred's idea, but it is George who finds the place and organizes the money while Fred takes care of the merchandise.

Potterwatch is Lee's idea, carefully organized after weeks of hiding Muggleborns in their basement. It's their way to fight, their way to say _Look, we are here, you did not kill us, you cannot make us silent._

They leave the shop in a friend's hands, and dedicate their time to it. They are here, the three (or two, who knows ?) of them, listening, talking, protesting. They know more than anyone in this war.

They are ones of the first to know about Hogwarts, of course.

* * *

George does not see Fred die. What he sees, after hours of fighting, is his body lying on the hard floor of the Great Hall. It has to be his, after all, because they are Fred-and-George and George-and-Fred and they lived together and they were supposed to die together and Fred promised.

He doesn't hear his mother's scream. He doesn't hear anything except his heart beating alone, because his other half stopped to do so.

He doesn't cry. His eyes are fixed on his twin's smile, the same as his. And he knows, looking at that smile, that it will never leave his mind as long as he lives. A life without Fred, because Fred is lying, dead-

(Here's a thing about twins : you don't understand how much the other is a part of yourself until you lose them.)

* * *

_I gave you all of me. I was there when no one was._

_Now you're gone, and I'm here._

* * *

Fred is dead and so are Fred-and-George. George is the only one alive.

He doesn't remember the days after the battle. He doesn't come to the funerals, Lupin's, Tonks's, Lavender's, Colin's, _Fred's_. He lies in his bed, alone in the Burrow, thinking.

Weasley's Wizard Wheezes is what first enters his mind, strangely. He has so many questions about it. It was Fred's idea, Fred's dream.

It will have to be George's dream now.

* * *

Weasley's Wizard Wheezes opens six months after the war. There is only one employee. No one is stupid enough to point it out.

Lee Jordan tries to come and help. George kicks him out, because he is nothing but salt on a fresh wound.

Ron comes too, and George pushes him away, because his little brother doesn't belong in this shop, not when he longs to follow Harry Potter and Hermione Granger, to join the Aurors like most of th D.A. Actually, most of those who fought in the Battle could have a post within the Aurors.

  
  
They ask George to join them. He refuses, and stays with his ghost.

* * *

Angelina comes, with grief and fury in her eyes. George lets her in, because he is breaking faster than his family fixes him and he needs someone.

He tells her this over Fire Whiskey. She takes his hand, as fierce as she was during all of her Quidditch matches.

“There's nothing to fix.” she says, and George almost believes her.

* * *

Oliver comes too, a few days later. George lets him in, with Fred's voice and Angelina's words ringing in his ear. They close the shop, the one that he hasn't left since opening it, and take their brooms.

George isn't a chaser, but when he strikes a goal against Oliver, the weight in his chest lighten a bit. It's not enough, but it's a start.

The next day, the shop is closed. But George is outside, with two of his friends. He doesn't smile, hasn't been able too since seeing Fred's dead one, but he's here.

* * *

He goes to the Burrow once. His mother breaks down once she sees him.

  
  
He doesn't come back.

* * *

Percy is the first to gather the courage to confront him. It's a morning, a few hours before Weasley's Wizard Wheezes's opening, but neither of them slept a full night since the beginning of the war.

He enters the shop like a man on a death row, face blank, resigned, and stares at George like he is seeing a ghost. Well, he is.

“It's my fault.” he says, and George punches him. His older brother falls on a box Loonar Loop Luminators.

“It's not.” George whispers, and they drink together, even though it's morning and the shop will have to open.

_Perfect Percy drinking,_ George thinks, and hears Fred's laughter.

* * *

Angelina notices the lack of mirrors in the shop, and drags him to a hairdresser with a stern look. George doesn't protest, because she is one of the few who don't look at him with pity.

He stares at his own reflexion until he feels sick, and grabs a lock of redhair.

“I want it purple.” he says, and Angelina smiles.

* * *

He adds mirrors in the shop. Not a lot, but enough.

His mother shrieks when she sees him, but she doesn't cry, at least not in front of him. His father looks sad, but he smiles too.

“Do you want to go out with me ?” he asks Angelina, hair wet and purple.

She raises an eyebrow.

  
  
“Took you long enough.”

* * *

Two years after the war, he goes to see Fred's grave. He sits down in front of it, daffodils and red roses in his hands.

“You know, I hated you a bit.” he says, because Fred had always preferred when people got to the point, “I think you hated me a bit too, because we're twins and we understand each other, but no one tried to understand us as something more than the Weasley Twins. And I think- I think it hurt you too, even though you didn't show it either. You were always so ambitious. Almost Slytherin.” he adds with a wry laugh.

He hums, and looks at the bouquet of flowers.

“I loved you more than anything. You were everything to me, and you're still haunting me, aren't you ? I used to see you everwhere I went. And when Mum looked at me, she saw you instead of me. I guess she finally recongnized you as your own person. I had to dye my hair to make her remember that I was George. It's purple, by the way. I think you would have liked it.”

There's a long silence, until George slowly gets up. He looks at the grave, at his twin who will forever be younger than him, and leaves him behind.

  
  
When he gets out, the sun is shining, and he feels like George, just George. He smiles.


End file.
